West Aurora School District 129 student expulsions spiked in February, when seven students were expelled within one month, school board records show.

The students were expelled in connection with four separate incidents, district spokesman Tony Martinez said. He declined to elaborate on the incidents, saying they were student discipline matters.

Three of the expulsions were tied to a Jan. 18 fight previously reported by the Beacon-News. Martinez said none of the expulsions was related to a recent, unfounded threat made against West Aurora High School, in which disorderly conduct charges were filed against a 15-year-old and later upgraded to a felony, Martinez said.

District officials are not aware of any reason for the spike, Martinez said. They meet regularly with law enforcement to check in on neighborhood crime and gang violence trends, but they could not point to anything that could be causing the uptick, he said.

Martinez said expulsion decisions are difficult, but sometimes when students break rules, action must be taken.

"We're in the business of educating students, and that's our No. 1 goal," he said. "Safety, security and also educating our students. We don't take those decisions lightly."

In 2016, a law took effect that was designed in part to limit discipline that removes students from school. Under the law, certain types of discipline — including expulsions, longer suspensions or placement in an alternative school — can be used only if a student's presence in class is deemed a significant disruption or threat, or if administrators have tried other measures. It also prohibits zero-tolerance policies that lead to automatic suspensions or expulsions for certain behavior, and sets other requirements.

West Aurora school board documents outline any prior behavioral and disciplinary measures in each of the seven expulsion cases.

The students were expelled for varying lengths of time, and each could be transferred at some point to an alternative school, school board records show. Each could be allowed to transition back to a general West Aurora school at later dates, school board records show.

Last year, the district had one expulsion, Martinez said, a scenario he said was unusual.

Martinez said the seven students expelled amounted to less than 0.1 percent of the district's students.

"We have a lot of things in place, a lot of positive programming and conversation with parents and students," Martinez said. "It's just unfortunate that some situations rose to that level, to have us make those hard (expulsion) decisions."